SCHOONEJONGEN: Complacent, insulated Obama brought down to earth

It somehow evens the score a bit when the guy everyone thinks is going to lose actually wins one. President Barack Obama, initially underestimated in the Democratic primaries in 2008, probably was the beneficiary of that peculiar American tendency four years ago, but it may have worked against him on Wednesday night.

How else can we explain the excitement over GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney's clear bettering of Obama during that night's debate in Denver? It was a race again. The underdog (if a multimillionaire can be that) showed some life and now had a chance.

We've long been treated to the theory that Obama is the smartest guy in the room, a towering intellect and brilliant speaker. Even his failings as president can be overlooked, the theory goes, because, well, he's just so darn better than the alternatives.

That theory works fine for a while, but all that worship sets up somebody to be an underdog. As unlikely as that seems, given his wealth and accomplishments, that guy in 2012 is Mitt Romney. He may not win in November. The American people may not even want Romney to win (for that judgment, we must wait until Election Day), but for a moment, if we are honest with ourselves, it was kind of fun to watch the president get taken down a peg.

The media obviously was enjoying it. Even professional bloviators who lean toward Obama's politics seemed to be having a good time bemoaning the fate of their guy. MSNBC's Chris Matthews, for example, tried to find increasingly hyperbolic ways of describing Obama's poor performance, producing a sort of verbal smorgasbord - something, it seemed, for everyone.

"The Latin root of condescension means we all sink," Nobel Prize-winning poet Seamus Heaney wrote in "Verses for a Fordham Commencement." Even the high-riders eventually fall, and most often there is no pity for the defeated, especially when they fail to see it coming.

The criticism of Obama's performance centered on that. Why didn't he see it coming? Why didn't he realize that Romney would come at him hard? Why wasn't he prepared?

Gov. Chris Christie provided as good an answer as anyone.

"I think the president thought he was going to come out there and hit a heavy bag around," Christie told radio host Don Imus Thursday morning. "And all of a sudden he found out that the guy has arms and he's going to punch, too. And I don't think the president is used to being spoken to like that."

Incumbent presidents have a history of poor performance in first debates during their run for re-election. Ronald Reagan in 1984 and George W. Bush in 2004 are examples. Perhaps it's the cocoon of the White House that creates the atmosphere for these spankings.

When you're being catered to at every turn, when everyone hangs on your every word and when your staff is convinced you're doing God's work, who is there to tell you when you're wrong? Who's there to tell you when you need to change your approach?

I remember a conversation I had with a longtime behind-the-scenes guy in Trenton politics not long after Christie took office. Although a Democrat, he tried to give me an honest assessment of Christie's administration. It was filled, he said, with bright and capable people, many of whom he knew and liked.

They had created an ambitious agenda, he admitted, before wondering whether they would accomplish their goals.

What could stop them, I asked, thinking perhaps he would give me a partisan response about firing up Democrats to fight against the Republican governor.

His reply surprised me: "Arrogance," he said.

Implied in the answer was that arrogance was not solely owned by the new administration. Other administrations had fallen prey to that contagion and failed because of it. His admonition was for the new team to not let it all go to their heads, to be careful.

Perhaps Obama has been careful. Perhaps the debate performance was just a misstep. Perhaps he recognizes his mistakes and will correct them. Or perhaps the president has failed to see that, as Heaney warned, we all sink.

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SCHOONEJONGEN: Complacent, insulated Obama brought down to earth

We like to root for the underdog in America. It somehow evens the score a bit when the guy everyone thinks is going to lose actually wins one.

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